Will Tesla Install Home Solar Panels To Charge Cars? (buffalonews.com) 81
Earlier this week, Tesla signed a non-binding agreement to buy solar cells from a new Panasonic factory in Buffalo, New York -- but it's part of a much bigger maneuver. An anonymous Slashdot reader writes:
"If all goes to plan, Tesla will be supplying customers with the solar panels that generate electricity that could then be used to charge the battery in their Tesla car or the battery in the Tesla Powerwall home energy storage system," reports the Christian Science Monitor. The Wall Street Journal reports that Musk's SolarCity "will sell, finance and install the panels."
But the Buffalo News suggests the deal is really "aimed squarely at skeptical shareholders" who may be leary of a proposed merger between Tesla and SolarCity," which one analyst calculates will require nearly $6 billion in extra capital. Panasonic could help shoulder the costs of the Buffalo factory, while also putting a more experienced manufacturer in charge of producing high-efficiency solar modules.
The Stack reports some shareholders have actually filed a lawsuit against the merger.
But the Buffalo News suggests the deal is really "aimed squarely at skeptical shareholders" who may be leary of a proposed merger between Tesla and SolarCity," which one analyst calculates will require nearly $6 billion in extra capital. Panasonic could help shoulder the costs of the Buffalo factory, while also putting a more experienced manufacturer in charge of producing high-efficiency solar modules.
The Stack reports some shareholders have actually filed a lawsuit against the merger.
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he is so careless about it because it's not his money.its either investors' or public money. he billions are just paper, it is investors who give value to it ( eg elizabeth holmes who became a billionaire and then went to zero just on paper) .
he has a blank cheque to fulfill his dreams at others' cost.
if investor want to waste it and lose money, let them.
public money should not be so wasted, but on the other hand, corrupt politicians like clinton has wasted it in worse ways .
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Right, Tesla's popular cars and SpaceX's rockets that supply the ISS are just paper... Exactly like Theranos' semi-fictional "wonder-machine"...
And what is all this about public money? Tesla is actually the only American car company that has repaid all their government loans, with interest.
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The key word there is 'almost'. Almost all startups fail in the end. People try things out and when they don't succeed, they are put out of business. The IP they create in the meantime is passed on to more capable people to continue trying with.
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You mean the company that is outselling BMW and Mercedes in the luxury car market? That niche company?
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You mean the company that is outselling BMW and Mercedes in the luxury car market? That niche company?
The company whose arguably mid-size luxury sedan is outselling BMW's and Mercedes' large luxury sedans [autotrader.com], yes.
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if investor want to waste it and lose money, let them.
I bought shares at ~$30 in 2011, sold recently at ~$200, which according to you is "waste and losing money". Whatever dude.
in other news (Score:2)
I can buy solar panels to charge the Tesla I don't have, or charge the Powerwall I don't have, or to power my house and put electricity into the grid.
And I don't have to buy them from Tesla – there are plenty of other sellers out there.
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And I don't have to buy them from Tesla â" there are plenty of other sellers out there.
Yeah, but if you have a Tesla roof, Powerwall, and Model 3, then it'll handle the credits for you among the reverse net metering, the panel, and your charge-ups at the SuperChargers.
If you put ten Teslets in at home yesterday, you can take ten Teslets out at the SuperCharger today.
Solar City, on its own, had to make up all of the finance costs from net-metering only. As part of Tesla, they can give you flexibility o
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Solar City, on its own, had to make up all of the finance costs from net-metering only. As part of Tesla, they can give you flexibility on how to handle the charges.
They could have done all this with a cross-marketing deal. They didn't have to merge just to cross-sell power credits.
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More economically efficient? It makes no difference economically.
Anyhow, the Tesla products are expected to cost a lot more than similar competitor products, so they are just using bundling a lot like cable TV companies do, to pay for more than you need.
Nevada (Score:4, Insightful)
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If reducing the subsidy killed home solar it was not viable in the first place.
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If we called fossil fuels to accoubt for their cost directly, we'd be paid for coal burning,
Nobody in America is building or investing in new coal power plants. Coal is dying. So comparing solar with coal is meaningless. You need to compare it with gas, which is way cleaner and half as carbon intensive.
Re: Nevada (Score:2)
Re: Nevada (Score:2)
Tesla shoud do something... (Score:2)
Tesla should do something to justify their "zero emission" vehicles claim.
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Maybe the US should clean up its electricity generation. The car itself isn't directly responsible for any emissions. Hydro power is claimed to be a clean form of electricity because fossil fuels aren't burnt but methane is release from decaying plant matter behind the the dam.
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The car is indirectly responsible for emissions, though.
And so Tesla should quit making 'zero emissions' vehicle claims.
There should be a big fat footnote after said 'claims,' which could help advocate for further reduced emissions in our electric generating capacity.
Otherwise they're just lying for purposes of hype and marketing.
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I just did, moron. "Zero emissions", clearly, refers to the car itself, not the production of the car. Otherwise, as I said in plain English, even a paperclip isn't "zero emissons".
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So let's roll in the emissions cost of the factories that manufacture regular cars, and the emissions of the trucks taking them to the dealerships, and all the emissions of the dealerships themselves, and the cost of dealing with the runoff from their massive parking lots (borne by the municipalities that host them), et cetera, et cetera.
They promised a zero emissions car and they delivered it. You can't make so much as a paperclip that's "zero emission" if you're going to count the upstream costs.
So basic
Re: Tesla shoud do something... (Score:2)
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They already have, they have put out a car with zero emissions.
will tesla (Score:1)
Will Tesla eat cheese?
What will Tesla get for Christmas?
What would Jesus do?
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Jesus drives a Tesla
For all the night shift Tesla owners (Score:3)
Sure, you could charge a powerwall and then charge your Tesla at night from that, but there would be a lot of inefficiency in addition to heavy cycling on the powerwall.
But overall it doesn't seem like a compelling sales pitch -- buy solar panels to charge the car that will be at work when the sun is shining.
Maybe the spreadsheet math works financially by offsetting daytime use vs. nighttime charging.
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If you are in the right jurisdiction then solar panels would be a good decision. Use the panels to generate electricity during the day and sell it into the grid. At night charge the car when the price of electricity is cheaper. You save by not buying the batteries and depending on the price difference you might be able to pay off the panels fairly quickly.
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Re:For all the night shift Tesla owners (Score:5, Informative)
Now add the Tesla and solar panels on your house:
x + y kWh generated, x + y kWh consumed
x + y kWh generated, x + y kWh consumed. Same as above.
Basically, if you work the day shift, the addition of your solar panels at your house reduces the amount of power the coal plant needs to generate by y kWh. When you plug the Tesla into a charger at work, it increases the amount of power the coal plant needs to generate by y kWh. And the whole thing is a wash. Exactly the same as if you charged the Tesla at home using (only) power from your home solar panels.
A lot of people don't seem to get this. The marginal increase power use doesn't have to be directly connected to the marginal increase in power generation to have the same effect. This is also why you should conserve electricity even if you're in the Pacific Northwest which is powered mostly by hydroelectric. Any reduction in your consumption means a little bit of hydro power is left over and can be transmitted to the rest of the country, and a coal plant elsewhere needs to burn a little less coal. Exactly the same as if someone living next to the coal plant conserved electricity.
For the same reason, EVs are predominantly powered by electricity from coal and natural gas, not by renewables. Those are the two power generation sources which are flexible enough to ramp up with increases in demand. EVs are only powered by electricity from renewables if you wouldn't have built the renewable plant if you hadn't bought the EV. If you would've built the renewable plant anyway, then it results in a marginal decrease in the generation from coal and gas, while the addition of an EV results in a marginal increase in the generation from coal and gas. So the EV's power is coming from coal and gas. This is the case even if the electricity from your solar panels are going straight to your EV. If in the absence of your EV the electricity from your solar panels would've instead gone onto the grid, then by putting it into your EV you are depriving the grid of those kWh, and a coal/gas plant elsewhere needs to generate those kWh.
Tesla understands this, which is why they're trying to link home solar installation with EV car purchases. If you can link the two, then the purchase of the EV results in the installation of PV solar generation which would not have existed without the EV. And then you can truthfully say the EV is being powered by electricity from solar.
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I added solar panels to my home installation to cover my Tesla electricity usage... zero emissions (and zero electricity bill).
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Localization of the power source doesn't matter. Everything is interconnected by the grid anyway
I'll stop you right there, the moment you say that it means some people might want solar panels and some want a Tesla, but there's no synergy whatsoever. That there's no particular benefit to owing both a solar panel and a Tesla that doesn't exist independently. If that is the case, they don't really have anything to do with each other any more than Tesla and SpaceX. Either or none or both might be a success, but they don't depend on each other at all. It doesn't matter who owns them, they'll succeed or fai
Why the need for Tesla to buy SolarCity? (Score:1)
Isn't Musk the Chairman of SolarCity, which is run by his cousins and has SpaceX as a large shareholder?
Whats the point? (Score:5, Insightful)
What's the point of this?
Most people who charge at home, charge at night. So, without storage, solar panels don't help.
But it's not "some storage", it's lots of storage. The largest residential Powerwall is 10kWh, so you would need 2 1/2 of these to fully charge a Leaf. A Tesla with the smallest 60 kWh battery would require 10 of them.
If you charge every night and drive an average commute (30-40 miles/day), then I suppose one Powerwall would be sufficient.
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Whoops, not 10, but, obviously 6! A P100 model would require 10 for a full charge.
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The transmission lines are efficient, but don't scale especially well. The utility primary substations are a major choke point. Distributed gene
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That's idiotic nonsense. Most people who charge their electric car at home, switch to peak/off-peak billing with their electric company. That means electricity used before midnight is insanely expensive, but solar panels can offset most of that daytime demand. And after midnight you can charge your car for a pittance.
https://www.greentechmedia.com... [greentechmedia.com]
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My Tesla uses about 300 Wh/mile. At 12,000 miles a year, that's 3600 kWh/year.
My solar panels generate about 9000 kWh/year. That's enough to keep my car charged and my house running with a zero electric bill.
My solar system is rather small, only 6.2 kW. I can easily add more capacity if necessary.
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$70,000 tesla vehicle.
$15,000-$20,000 solar panel installation costs (give or take).
Department of Energy average houshold electric bill is about $110.00 per month.
You sir have just paid about 75 years worth of electric bills already just to drive a vehicle with no fuel costs.
Will a PowerWall allow fast charging? (Score:1)
Will a PowerWall allow fast charging?
Is fast charging desirable or destructive?
How many PowerWalls are needed to fully charge your 'average' Tesla?
Irrespective, solar us a logical step with an electric car. BUT in one of the possible futures we won't have a car, garage or driveway. Indeed there won't be cars parking out the roads as the cars will be stationed/charged somewhere else and summoned on demand. In that possible future, the PowerWall would still be available for the house and grid so that future
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Tesla should come up with a rapid-battery-swap technology, so that on alternating days you use the battery that isn't being charged.
Now, that's a lot more expensive than just having your customers burn out their 'powerwall' battery bank quickly by fast charging from it each night. But it's more practical and efficient in the long run.